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It's the perfect time of year for gingerbread cookies, but what do you do with all that excess ginger? Well, maybe put it in a horse's butt? No, no, don't do that. But some people do. All that and more on this week's history of ginger. Show notes

We gave our staff the awesome responsibility of choosing the best comedy albums of 2015. They listened to hours and hours of material, and we're now prepared to showcase some of the best comedy released in the past year.

Sleater-Kinney is one of the most-loved indie bands of the past two decades. The band formed in the latter days of the riot grrrl movement in Olympia, Washington, and found an intense following. They were fierce, and they let their ideas "fill the room".

After recording eight albums and tons of touring, they went on hiatus. The band's members pursued other musical and creative projects, but there was a nagging question -- what would it be like if Sleater-Kinney returned?

In January of this year, the band released a new record called No Cities to Love. It had been nearly a decade since their last LP.

Corin Tucker, the group's co-founder, joins us to talk about soaking up the punk and riot grrrl scenes of the early 1990s, finding her voice, and why Sleater-Kinney returned.

Kyle Kinane lives every day as if his good luck is about to run out. Or at least, what he considers to be good luck. Kinane has worked hard refining his stand up comedy for fifteen years and taken the leap from Chicago to Los Angeles to further his career, but part of him still can't believe he gets paid to tell jokes.

His comedy is often a special brand of self-deprecation. So many of his jokes are about him messing up. Falling out of the shower. Literally throwing away money. But he says he finds the joy in these moments.

He joins us to talk about how he started out in stand up, measuring his success in comedy, and his life philosophy of "can, so should".

Kinane's just finishing up a round of tourdates in the Midwest (if you move fast, you can catch him this week in Ohio and Indiana). You can find all of his upcoming shows on his website, or check out I Liked His Old Stuff Better in audio and video format via Comedy Central.

You can let us know what you think of International Waters and suggest guests on the MaxFun forum or through our Facebook page. Follow us on Twitter for updates on guests and when we’ve just posted a new episode (hint: it’ll be 1st and 15th of every month).

Ten years ago, an indie film called The Room entered theaters in Los Angeles. It showed in two theaters, and it grossed only $1800 before it was pulled. The few critics who saw it, panned it. The dialogue was stilted and the plot didn't make sense. It was billed as a drama, but the effect was comedy. The movie was written and directed by its star, Tommy Wiseau.

Though he may not have intended to, Wiseau created a film that's been hailed as "the best bad movie ever made".

Comedian Kyle Kinane details a couple of his latest interactions with other beings -- both human and feline.
This set was recorded at MaxFunCon 2013, held in Lake Arrowhead, California. Tickets for MaxFunCon 2014 go on sale the day after Thanksgiving. More information can be found here.

The Los Angeles Times book critic and blogger Carolyn Kellogg stops by to share some of her favorite new books. She suggests The Encyclopedia of Early Earth, a graphic novel of fake fables (have you heard the one about the old lady and the poisoned sausages?).

Tavi Gevinson's interest in the artistry of fashion inspired her to start her blog, Style Rookie, when she was in middle school. Drawn to unusual color combinations, proportions, and textures, Gevinson sought to create narratives with her outfits -- which caught flack at school, even as fashion magazines praised her sense of style.

Most recently, Gevinson founded and serves as Editor-in-Chief of the online magazine Rookie, a beautifully curated website for teen girls featuring content spanning myriad topics, including feminism, fashion, and how to build the very best forts. Gevinson has curated some of Rookie's first two years of content into Rookie Yearbook One and Rookie Yearbook Two.

Gevinson joins us to discuss what sparked her foray into the fashion world, people's tendency to fixate on her age, and the qualities that make people worth writing about.

For some of the best hanging out ever committed to film, Jordan Morris suggests a viewing of The Station Agent, starring Peter Dinklage and Bobby Canavale. Then, grab a friend and prepare to get to know them better.

Kumail Nanjiani and Emily V. Gordon, co-hosts of video game podcast The Indoor Kids, join us to share their favorite new releases. Their first pick is Ms. Splosion Man, an imaginative platformer newly available on iOS. (Think Super Mario meets spontaneous self-combustion.) For a lengthier experience, check out BioShock Infinite, which (literally) takes the first BioShock to even greater heights.

Nearly ten years have passed since the release of writer/director Shane Carruth's first low-budget film, a complex time travel movie called Primer. Film fans are still obsessed with teasing out the intricacies of the story, about a time-travel machine and the men who engineered the machine. But within that story, there are emotional and ethical struggles that keep the audience riveted -- a quality that's become a hallmark of Carruth's small but powerful filmography.

Carruth wrote, directed, starred and composed all of the music for Primer, and he had the same all-consuming roles in his new film, Upstream Color. The movie is just as difficult to explain as his first. Upstream Color's two lead characters seem to have a shared experience of bodily manipulation, and cling to that sameness because they have nothing else. The movie delves deeply into identity and loss, and comes through with a powerful emotional experience.

Shane Carruth joins us to talk about the upsides and downsides of independent filmmaking, why plot summary doesn't always get to a movie's heart, and the best James Bond movie that will never be made.

Upstream Color is in select theaters nationwide. The film is available on DVD, Blu-Ray, and on demand on May 7.

Kyle Kinane had a problem. He was craving fast food, but he'd had a little too much to drink. But he found a solution. It involved a little bit of ingenuity, a wallet's worth of cash, and a very patient cab driver.

This clip comes from Kyle Kinane's latest special, Whiskey Icarus, which is available as a digital download or a CD/DVD. He'll be performing at MaxFunCon 2013 in late May.

Stanley Kubrick's movie The Shining made a huge cultural impression. It's a classic horror movie about the psychological tolls of isolation, the dissolution of a family, the Holocaust, and how Kubrick helped fake the moon landing.

Wait a second. The Holocaust? Moon landing? Yep. The new documentary Room 237 features increasingly eye-widening theories about the hidden subtexts of The Shining. Movies often inspire intense debate over authorial intent, but Kubrick's known perfectionism and deliberate filmmaking often take this discussion to another level.

Room 237's director Rodney Ascher sits down with us to discuss some of the film's more creative theories, as well as whether or not there's such a thing as too much interpretation.

Room 237 is out now in select theaters nationwide and available on video on-demand.

Pop music is usually for young people – what better audience is there for short, simple, high-energy music? But what does pop music sound like when it grows up? To answer that question, Jesse takes a look at a song by George Jones, called The Grand Tour.

It was a great year in comedy, so selecting the best of the best and compiling it into an hour-long special was a tall order. We have done just that, however, and we're kicking a new year off with a bang and The Best Comedy of 2012, as curated by the Bullseye staff.

You'll hear selections from the following, all of which are available for purchase now: